It used to be that blogs looked like blogs and websites looked like websites. You could easily tell the two apart.
Then the WordPress CMS came along and everything changed. Now, it’s becoming more difficult to tell if a site is being powered by a “blogging” CMS tool like the WP publishing platform, or if it’s been built using a traditional website development tool. Not so much in terms of what the sites are being used for, but in terms of website design and also being able to tell what type of web application is actually powering the site.
(Can You Tell Which Application Is Powering Your Website?)
For many website owners, understanding the difference between a CMS application like WordPress and other website-building tools is huge, not so much in terms of the technical differences, but more importantly, in terms of the things that matter to most website owners, like web development costs, ease of use, ability to keep the website up-to-date, managing web content, etc.
Think about this …
Which of the following options would you choose?
A) An eye-catching, professional-looking website that turns out to be fairly expensive to build, or
B) The same eye-catching, professional-looking site, but at a cost that turns out to be significantly less than the cost of getting option “A” above.
If you selected web site “B”, then you need to learn more about the benefits of using WordPress, why WordPress can provide you with an eye-catching website that could turn out to be far less expensive to build than websites which use a web development application … and how to tell these apart!
WordPress is the world’s most popular online publishing platform and content management system (CMS). It is a budget-friendly content management system suitable for local businesses.
Whether your reason for having a web site is for personal blogging or business use, WordPress is easy enough for a beginner with no programming skills to use, and offers a range of helpful functions that make your website more effective in terms of getting your content published and indexed by search engines, promoting visitor interaction, generating business leads and sales, enhancing your site’s functionality, scalability, etc.
With almost one in every five websites around the world currently being powered by WordPress, chances are that if you already own a website, yours is also a WordPress site.
And if you don’t have a website yet, or are considering getting one built, then wouldn’t it be great to be able to show your web developer an existing site with the design and layout that you like, know that it was built with WordPress and that you can, therefore, get something similarly built for very little cost?
Is My Website WordPress?
Do you need to know if a website uses WordPress? Maybe you’ve come to this page because you’ve read wonderful things about WordPress, and you’re now wondering if your site was built using WordPress, or some other CMS.
Also, have you ever looked at a competitor’s website and wondered what they’re doing to try and get better results online?
Knowing if your competitor’s site is built with WordPress can tell you a few things about their strategies and methods, such as what themes or plugins they are using.
Here are some simple ways to tell if a site is running on WordPress:
Look At Your Source Code
If you know how to access the source code of a web page (e.g. Firefox Menu > Web Developer > Page Source if using Firefox, or Google Menu > More Tools > View Source if using Google Chrome), you can look for obvious telltale footprints …
(Viewing the page source code in the Firefox browser)
Let’s say that you are surfing the web and you come across a website that you like, and you’re wondering if the site uses WordPress …
First, bring up the site’s source code on your screen, using the methods described above.
In the source code, search for “wp-content” either by visually scanning the code …
Or use the browser’s “Find” function …
(Use the Firefox browser ‘Find’ function)
This will quickly tell you if the site was built using WordPress or not.
Note: If you cannot find the words “wp-content” within the page source code, it doesn’t necessarily mean that this is not a WordPress site.
There are other ways to find out if a site runs on WordPress, as we will soon be discussing.
As the focus of this article is to try and help non-technical users, however, we have listed below a number of easier ways to check if your site is built using WordPress other than looking at the source code.
Simply Ask Your Website Developer
While this may seem like the most logical thing to do, some website developers, for whatever reason, may build their clients a website and not tell them it’s been built with WordPress.
If you have an existing web site and you can’t tell what application is driving it, just ask your web developer or whoever built your website if your website was built with WordPress.
That was easy, huh?
Okay … what if you can’t get in touch with the person who built your website, or what if you’ve come across a website that you really like while surfing the net and need to know if it was built with WordPress?
Powered By WordPress
If the site uses a WordPress theme where the website theme templates have not been edited, you will often find a “Proudly powered by WordPress” message showing at the bottom of the site …
(Powered by WordPress – site footer)
If these simple methods haven’t helped you, here are some other ways of identifying WordPress sites …
Sites That Can Tell You If A Website Was Built Using WordPress
Here are a couple of tools that will tell you if the website uses WordPress or not, and what themes or plugins the site uses …
Is It WordPress? – WP Website Checker
(Is It WP – WordPress Website Checker)
Is It WP? is a free tool that tells you if a site runs on WordPress or not.
Using this tool is really quite easy. Just enter the URL of the site into the URL field and click the button.
It will search through the URL files and tell you if the site was built using WordPress, and if so, which version of WordPress it is currently using …
If the site is not a WP site, you will get a message like the one shown below …
To visit this site, go here:
Advanced WP Theme Checker by Satori
(WordPress Theme Detector)
WordPress Theme Detector by Satori Studio is a free tool that can help determine whether or not a website uses WordPress as its CMS engine; it will also tell you which theme the site is using and provide a link to the theme’s official page.
To use this tool, paste the URL of a web page (it doesn’t have to be the home page) into the ‘Enter website URL’ field and click on the ‘What WordPress theme is that?’ button …
(Enter website URL and click the button)
The Theme Detector will automatically scan the website and output its theme information …
(WordPress Theme Detector displays theme results)
If a website is built with WordPress but the theme is too customized to contain any traces of its origins, the Detector will still let you know it’s a WP site by outputting a message on the right.
(Modified WordPress theme message)
If the website is not using WordPress at all, the tool will also let you know …
(This website is not WordPress)
You can try the Detector yourself by visiting this link:
Wappalyzer
(Wappalyzer – Web Browser Add-On (Firefox / Chrome))
If you use either the Firefox or Chrome web browser and want to be able to tell if the sites that you are visiting are WP sites, then Wappalyzer is a great add-on to install on your browser.
Wappalyzer identifies what software is installed in the sites while you are browsing.
According to their website …
“Wappalyzer is a browser extension that uncovers the technologies used on websites. It detects content management systems, eCommerce platforms, web servers, JavaScript frameworks, analytics tools and many more.”
It’s also easy to install.
Once you have installed Wappalyzer, icons will appear in your web browser menu allowing you to see which software is being used by the sites you are visiting …
If the WordPress icon displays on your browser menu (as the above screenshot shows), then the site uses WordPress.
(It’s a WordPress site!)
Go here to visit the Wappalyzer browser add-on site:
SpyBar
(SpyBar – Browser Addon For WordPress)
SpyBar is a browser addon that lets you ‘reverse engineer’ any WordPress site you visit and see which WordPress plugins and themes are being used, right inside your web browser …
(SpyBar – Discover WordPress Plugins And Themes Used By Your Competitors)
SpyBar can be installed as a browser extension on Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox and is compatible with PC and Mac.
To download or learn more about SpyBar, go here:
Plugin Sniper
(Plugin Sniper – Find out what plugins a WordPress site is using)
Plugin Sniper lets you find out what plugins a WordPress site is using. This is a useful tool if you want to know what WordPress plugins are being used by your competitors.
Plugin Sniper is also a useful tool for researching what kinds of plugins businesses in certain niches are using …
(Search WordPress sites by categories and location)
To download or learn more about Plugin Sniper, visit the site below:
I hope that you have found this the information in this tutorial useful.
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"These tutorials have so much information and are easy to understand. If you use WordPress or plan to in the future these will help you with everything you need to know." - Valisa (Mesa, Arizona)